Bank Negara Malaysia and the Bank of Thailand joined Singapore’s BLOOM initiative as policymaker members on October 23, 2026, expanding a public-private effort to help financial institutions use stablecoins and tokenized deposits for cross-border payments.
Key Takeaways
- Malaysia and Thailand’s central banks have joined BLOOM as policymaker members.
- The initiative aims to reduce the need for separate arrangements with each counterparty or market.
- Its scope extends beyond payments to corporate cash management, trade finance and AI-agent transactions.
Table of Contents
- BLOOM initiative targets cross-border payment complexity
- Work extends beyond transfers to business finance
- Conclusion
BLOOM initiative targets cross-border payment complexity
The Monetary Authority of Singapore says BLOOM is intended to cut costs and help financial institutions bring services to market faster. Its approach seeks to reduce the need for institutions to establish separate arrangements with every counterparty or market.
The addition of two central banks broadens policymaker participation. It is not, by itself, an announcement that a new payment service has launched or that institutions have achieved measurable cost savings.
The MAS cross-border settlement announcement page was unavailable in the supplied official material, displaying a service-unavailable notice rather than the release text. Its detailed terms therefore could not be checked against that document.
| Item | Details |
|---|---|
| BLOOM name | Borderless, Liquid, Open, Online, Multi-currency. |
| Initiative launched | October 2025. |
| Earlier foundation | Project Orchid began in 2021 to explore uses for a digital Singapore dollar. |
Work extends beyond transfers to business finance
BLOOM also covers corporate cash management, trade finance and payments executed by artificial-intelligence agents within predefined limits. The scope therefore includes how businesses manage and deploy money, rather than cross-border transfers alone.
Participants include Airwallex, Mastercard, Ripple, Visa and the World Bank Group, bringing payment companies and a development institution into the public-private initiative.
Separately, Bank Negara Malaysia announced in February 2026 that three initiatives would test ringgit stablecoins and tokenized deposits for domestic and cross-border wholesale payments during 2026. Those planned tests are distinct from the central bank’s newly announced BLOOM membership.
Conclusion
The membership expansion adds regional policymakers to BLOOM’s digital-money work. Malaysia’s separately announced wholesale-payment tests remain a concrete area to watch during 2026; the supplied information gives no further BLOOM rollout date.
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